Hidden Cores On Phenom CPUs Can Be UnlockedStudy Finds Fast-Food Logos Make You ImpatientGizmodo Blows Whistle On 4G iPhone LoserWhat Will the Browser Look LIke In Five Years?History Repeats Itself, Mac & the iPadBitTorrent CEO On Net NeutralityAmazon Fights For Privacy of Customer RecordsThe Nuts and Bolts of PlayStation 3DQuantum Cyrptography Now Fast Enough For VideoAn Early Look At Next-Gen Shooter BodycountIE8's XSS Filter Exposes Sites To XSS AttacksSource Code To Google Authentication System StolenWhat Is the Future of Firewalls?Adding Some Spice To *nix Shell ScriptsSEC Proposes Wall Street Transparency Via PythonRoger Ebert On Why Video Games Can Never Be ArtFatal Flaw Discovered In Invisibility CloaksNetwork Solutions Sites Hacked AgainEU Piracy Estimates -- Just How Inaccurate?Why Computer Science Students CheatUS House Passes Ban On Caller ID SpoofingPalm WebOS Hacked Via SMS MessagesGeorge Washington Racks Up 220 Years of Late Fees At LibraryWhy Aren't SSD Prices Going Down?Cows On Treadmills Produce Clean Power For FarmsThis Is Apple's Next iPhone

A whopping three Apple articles out of the last 26, and two are from a developing story about a lost iPhone prototype. You people claiming Slashdot is full of Apple articles are full of shit. If you don't like Apple stories, use that thing on the right side of the window called a scrollbar and scroll past them.

IdleMainAppleAskSlashdotBook ReviewsDevelopersGamesHardwareIdle (yes, this one should be turned off again)ITIndexInterviewsLinuxMobilePoliticsScienceTechnologyYROIdle (just in case we missed it the first two times)

If the story is accurate, then what's the point of exposing the poor sod's name?

What purpose does that serve? The guy's obviously had a rough week; why pile on and make it worse?

It's likely that he's going to be terminated (from his employment, not physically), if he hasn't been already. I'm sure there's some "handling company materials" guideline or somesuch on the books at Apple that will be enforced.

That reminds me an anecdote from a Apple engineer working on the first Mac (from a PBS special way back when; probably on YouTube somewhere.) Steve Jobs was pressuring him to knock a few more seconds on the time required for the Mac to boot up. They're already trying to meet the deadline for rollout and the guy is completely stressed out and asks Why, it's only a few seconds, what's the big deal? Steve replies that the Macs collectively will be started up hundreds of millions of times over their lifespans. So if we manage to reduce the boot time by ten seconds, that'll add up to decades of time saved amongst all the Mac users. That's the equivalent of saving the lives of one or more Mac users! The engineer says that Steve putting such issues in perspective like that is one of the ways he motivates the folks at Apple to go that extra mile to deliver (for the most part) stellar products.

So who knows? From Steve Jobs' point of view, maybe this guy did kill somebody.

A guy at work knocked over a table sending about 70k USD worth of very sensitive equipment crashing to the floor.Know what he got? A generous amount of "bwhahahha, that has to hurt" comments from coworkers and it generated a little inquiry from management asking:

Why the -hell- was that much sensitive equipment stacked on a table with wonky legs... Brains people, brains!

The guy was not fired. Firing him would be stupid as he has now learned his lesson and he is the least likely person to do such a fuckup again;)

Because they are assholes and exposing him lends credence to their story, the story that pulled in so many hits that the entire Gawker group of blogs had to turn off comments for most of the day to handle the load being generated. The story that most of the non-Gizmodo sites were calling bullshit on because no one thought that it'd be plausible that they could come into possession of one of the phones in the way that they explained. The story that is likely to get get someone on their staff in trouble for being in possession of stolen goods, industrial espionage, and etc.

And, since they've realized this, they are doing their best to cover their asses by doing everything they can now to look like they were simply attempting to get it back to him rather than paying $5k to get an exclusive look at it.

And, since they've realized this, they are doing their best to cover their asses by doing everything they can now to look like they were simply attempting to get it back to him rather than paying $5k to get an exclusive look at it.

The problem is that they're covering their asses by creating additional privacy liabilities. This is an invasion of this poor guy's privacy. The First Amendment likely won't protect them here, either. This guy isn't someone famous and it was not necessary, for the story, to out him.

The result of this unethical move is that the guy who lost the phone may now reasonably lay down economic losses for his inability to find a future job plus pain and suffering because of the publicity he received. Add on to t

Right. I mean, given how tightly Apple controls these things, it's not like they don't already know who lost it. Poor SOB probably had to face his superior before news got out that it had been leaked, and if he didn't, he wouldn't have survived any decent effort to find out which unit was missing.

If anything, this just means Apple can't obliterate his career without anyone else knowing why....not to say they'd do that, or not, I dunno.

They already knew. They wiped it remotely the very night it happened. The next morning, it was a brick. A shiny brick with interesting electronics inside.

To wipe it remotely, they obviously knew that it was lost, which means one of two things. Either the guy reported the lost phone immediately or they figured out that it was lost by GPS/whatever else. Either way, they knew exactly which phone and exactly who lost it.

Seems to me that it's all part of Steve's marketing campaign... This guy probably never existed in real life and the guy playing his role will soon start shooting videos threatening to disclose more information, prototypes, etc a la Bin Laden and leaking them to Arab news networks from time to time so everyone at Apple is scared and work harder...

Seems to me that it's all part of Steve's marketing campaign... This guy probably never existed in real life and the guy playing his role will soon start shooting videos threatening to disclose more information, prototypes, etc a la Bin Laden and leaking them to Arab news networks from time to time so everyone at Apple is scared and work harder...

Wow you went from rational skeptic to tin-foil-hat loony in less than 2 sentences! My hat is off to you, sir.

Granted he's had a bad week, but it's also generated a reasonable degree of sympathy for the guy. I'd be surprised if Apple would want to court the bad publicity it would bring by firing the guy.
Make a mistake at Apple? Get fired? Doesn't come over well, especially when the public can now put a name and a face to him.
An anonymous engineer would have been easy to let go. This might just have saved his bacon.

He didn't just make a mistake. He left a prototype in a bar while out drinking. That's flat out incompetence and he should be fired for it. I have zero sympathy for the guy, this growing trend of business people and government officials leaving sensitive equipment and data behind is just pure incompetence and being lax.

[blockquote]He didn't just make a mistake. He left a prototype in a bar while out drinking.[/blockquote]

A prototype mobile phone which, assuming he was given it to test, there will always be a risk of losing. If my employer asked me to road test a phone, but I'd be fired if I lost it then I'd pass. If apple couldn't afford the risk of letting the device be lost, why did they give it to someone who has a chance of losing it in a public place?

Finally, someone who doesn't think this guy is the victim. HE IS THE WEAK LINK!! (I wish I had mod points. Sorry.)

When Apple said "here, carry around this priceless prototype phone and test it out" they most assuredly gave him a lecture on being careful and not losing it.

And he got plastered and lost it.

If I were Apple, if I didn't fire him outright I sure as hell wouldn't trust him anymore. So on second thought, if I can't trust him anymore, adios.And if I were hiring developers for a secretive project, I sure as hell wouldn't hire him either.

Gizmodo* did us a favor by telling us his name. Now his prospective employers know he can't be trusted to hang onto things entrusted to him.

(* Gizmodo is totally not innocent IMO, but a discussion of Gizmodo's actions is not the point of this comment.)

He didn't just make a mistake. He left a prototype in a bar while out drinking. That's flat out incompetence and he should be fired for it. I have zero sympathy for the guy, this growing trend of business people and government officials leaving sensitive equipment and data behind is just pure incompetence and being lax.

It's a prototype of a new phone. It's not a list of undercover CIA operatives.

Trunk of your car, god you're incompetent and shouldn't have a work laptop. Hell, you should be fired on the stop for such gross negligence. Do you know how trivial it is for someone to open your trunk while breaking into the front of your car? One little lever and it pops right open. Do you know how often cars are broken into nowadays? Doubt there's a car thief around who doesn't know people store the valuable stuff in the trunk.

If I was that guy and I didn't get fired over this I would be resigning because I guarantee that Apple would make my job such a living hell that I wouldn't fear Satan anymore because I would have first hand experience going in.

Anywhere else, perhaps. I'm not so sure with Apple. Between the RDF and the teflon nature of Apple, they might just decide they can get away with anything short of holding a public execution. They might even be right.

that being said, if he liked his job, why would he ever use a top-secret prototype as his day to day phone? these things do happen. did apple have a rule against taking the proto off property? out in public?

unless there was a rule to never bring the phone out in public, then i can't see how they could fire him. simple state the phone was stolen. could he be help accountable for that? there are many ways a phone could be stolen that doesn't involve negligence by the user. i.e., you get jumped outside the bar

There are things that are ok to lose...and there are things that are not ok to lose.

Your house keys, your car keys, your wallet, your purse, your shoes, your underwear, YOUR cell phone...all of those things are of relatively small value and the impact is felt by you.

Other things have intrensically more value - computers and/or media with SSNs/CC/medical records info, advanced prototypes you are playing with from the lab, 250 grams of purified plutonium...these things you dont carry around in your pocket or in your bag. You keep a close watch on these items because they can be VERY valuable to others and/or affect many other people.

So dude got outed - yeah - tough break for being stupid and careless with something valuable. Dick move by Gizmondo outing him to the world - you know damn well Apple already knew who did it and turned his ass into a playground but Gizmondo's move was salt in the wound.

How bad was it? Honestly - we all kind of have the idea that the thing is coming out in a few months...so it only spoils a little of Apple's fanfare.

In your Analogy you equated Apple with the KGB and Russia (who Americans apparently have sympathy for) with the engineer. So for your post to make sense the engineer needs to now become CEO of Apple so all that sympathy and good will can be directed towards Apple. The analogy doesn't really fit.

I'm still not convinced that this isn't a marketing ploy. I mean really, you get entrusted with the Next Most Awesome Device Ever, go out for drinks, show it off to your friends.... you wake up the next morning and you don't have it.

My wife has called bars, stores, restaurants, and cabbies to track down her crappy LG. You're telling me this guy never thought to call the bar the next day? Or that the bar sold it off before the guy could claim it?

I would expect that a sensitive field prototype would be required to have a 1 minute passcode lock and automatic total device wipe (including firmware) after a very small number of failed passcode entries.

Relying on remote wipe seems silly, since any serious industrial spy would put it in an RF-proof jacket ASAP and only examine it in a room sealed from outside RF to prevent remote wipe.

Now it may be that this isn't considered a terribly sensitive prototype -- maybe an early manufacturing sample being used for final testing before they ramp up to final production. They don't *want* it in the hands of the public, but they also wouldn't fire an employee who was let loose in the streets with it.

It *IS* a marketing ploy. There is *NO* reason why the apple and iphone names/logos should have been imprinted into this device if it is a prototype/testing device. Without the logos and with a good locking mechanism (as stated by others) this should only have appeared to be some knock-off device. As usual, all the stupid media (including/.) picks up on this and apple gets free publicity. Duh!

Except for the fact that it was designed to look like an iPhone 3GS... hence the fake case and that would explain the *LOGO* on it.

You guys like to make this out to be some big marketing conspiracy, but I don't think so. 1), I don't think Steve Jobs would approve of this. He's an egomaniac and I'm pretty sure he would think this sort of thing is juvenile. 2) Apple has field units. They have to do this in order to get *REAL* world results with their phones. It's not that uncommon and other companies do the s

My wife has called bars, stores, restaurants, and cabbies to track down her crappy LG. You're telling me this guy never thought to call the bar the next day? Or that the bar sold it off before the guy could claim it?

But the short answer: some guy at the bar apparently tried to figure out who owned it, failed (because the guy who lost it had already left), and started messing around with it trying to figure out the owner. Eventually he found the guy's Facebook page, and thought "Aha! I'll return this tomorrow". Unfortunately, when he woke up, the phone had been remotely bricked, so he couldn't get the contact info back again.

Yup, and that's why I call bullshit. This guy had the name, home/business phone number, and facebook account. Yet he didn't leave a message on any of those options? Supposing the phone is bricked he *still* has the facebook option.

It seems pretty obvious that he didn't want the phone to be recovered, but made a half-hearted attempt to cover his ass.

The summary is kind of slanted. Apple already knew who had lost the phone - they knew from the day after when they wiped it - Gizmodo just made that name public and did so in a fairly classy way. As a lot of comments on Gizmodo have pointed out, the public naming of the engineer isn't going to do anything more to hurt him, and could protect him a little from Steve Jobs firing him.

Not an advert (we do run ads on Slashdot, of course) but a badge indicating I'm one of a few Rackspace employees here on Slashdot and willing to be helpful if someone has questions, etc. If you check my bio you'll notice I'm a Linux Sr Sys Engineer, not sales (though "There's nothing wrong with that" if someone is in sales:) ).

I do the same thing for Rackspace elsewhere. We're able to do this due to our relationship with Slashdot.

Sorry buddy, but that relationship is commercial. Therefore any announcements of that relationship is an advert.

Wow. Here in the land of normal people, we *welcome* the announcement of these commercial relationships. It's called "full disclosure". Would you rather *not* know who a commentator is taking money from?

No kidding. You don't think that after this made the news, Apple wouldn't go "OK, I need everyone with a field prototype to show up in conference room F at 2 PM today. No exceptions, this takes precedence over anything else unless I have Steve's written approval otherwise."

Correct. Furthermore his career was already done for. Does anyone really think that just because his name wasn’t made public he’d be able to get fired by Apple and go on to work at another tech company without them learning of his involvement in this little fiasco?

Sure, Jobs is infamous for firing people who look at him cross-eyed. Given the small team size and secrecy for these kinds of projects he wasn't going to be a household name. The privacy would afford him the opportunity to position his exit from Apple on his own terms. Now when a recruiter types in his name on Google the first thing that will come up the article about him losing the phone.

I think the site has done a good job on the analysis.Gizmodo was a greedy site who wanted more hits, the author's an asshole who just wanted to cause more trouble for that guy for kicks.

Sure, he lost a prototype, but does he deserve his career ruined at other firms too? Definitely not.Especially problematic in the tech industry where employers are sure to run a Google search on prospective employees.

It actually probably protects him quite a bit, assuming this wasn't a marketing ploy to begin with.

Think about it, they know which phone it was because they wiped it the day after it was lost. More than likely the employee himself reported it missing (again, assuming it wasn't a marketing ploy) in order to protect what little chance he had to keep his job. Obviously they've known since day one who lost it, either way.

By publicly outing the guy, he is going to have a lot of people who think he should keep his job in spite of the mistake. That's what they call "public pressure". Now Apple could harm their public image by firing the guy, or they could improve it by keeping him on. That's a lot more support than a nameless employee is going to get.

You won't be able to tell if it is a marketing ploy, by the way, unless they fire the guy. If they fire him, it almost certainly is not a marketing ploy. If he keeps his job, it could have been a ploy all along, or it could just be Apple deciding it would be worth more than this guy's job for them to look merciful to their subjects... I mean employees.

Now Apple could harm their public image by firing the guy, or they could improve it by keeping him on. That's a lot more support than a nameless employee is going to get.

The guy made a mistake. People get fired for mistakes. Apple is within their rights to fire the guy. Yes I feel badly for the guy to get fired for making a mistake and he may get a lot of sympathy. Apple may get some bad press but nothing they do is remotely immoral or illegal in any way. If anything it sends a message to other Apple e

I find it hard to believe that Apple would just hand these things out without keeping track of who had them. It probably didn't take too long to figure out whose phone was missing once the first photos were published.

Double Bad Here -The engineer breaking company confidentiality was out of line. Getting fired will probably be the outcome.The "journalist" (such as it is here) revealed a confidential source. That said, they will never get anyone else to talk to them off the record.

Both did the wrong thing.People on the outside of Apple don't like the "hush hush" way they do product development, but that's part of how Apple functions. If I was getting my paycheck there (and I am not, but friends of mine do!) I would keep that stuff internal as the company wants.

"Loose lips sink ships" - Good thing its not a defense contract, and just a next generation piece of consumer electronic gadgetry.

The engineer didn't break confidentiality, he lost a prototype of a phone while out getting pissed on his birthday. That said no one talks to Gizmodo anyway, they are the ass end of tech blogs, about the only reason to go read them is if you are low on your daily kissup articles to Apple. The really amazing thing about this whole story is not that an Apple employee lost a prototype, it's that the tech blog that broke the story is the same one that spends most of it's time jizzing over Apple products to the point that you have to wonder if half the writers aren't working directly for Apple's marketing department.

I spend most of my time reading http://www.engadget.com/ [engadget.com] and http://arstechnica.com/ [arstechnica.com] depending on whether I want 'gossip' news or 'newspaper' news. Engadget was created by the original founder of Gizmodo, so to me it's a fairly close match minus the over the top Apple slant.

That isn't to say that they don't go pro-Apple sometimes, but it's far less "I love Apple and here are some of the reasons why you are an idiot if you don't" than Gizmodo's articles are.

And that really is the crux of the matter. Blogs and websites like to claim that they are as legitimate as broadcast and, dare I say it, print journalism. However, there are real [latimes.com] journalists [rcfp.org] who have done jail time for refusing to reveal names of sources to the government. You have to keep names off the record unless you are given consent by the party concerned. This guy was stupid for letting that device out of his hand, even for a second, but this may have unintended consequences for Gizmodo and its affiliates.

If you let one of these Apple engineers off the hook for their crimes against humanity, then you've got to make exception for them all. It's a slippery slope. First, Apple engineers today; tomorrow, lawyers and political figures. That's a social travesty we can not allow.

Because they abandoned it. At the time, they obviously didn't want it. They might have even left it there for you, and are simply changing their mind later. Either way, it isn't stealing because you never took it from them. In fact, you took it from nobody.You found it. The decent thing to do would be to just give it back, but it's not uncommon to ask for a finder's fee before returning it (though it is uncommon if someone lost it for such a short period of time).Seriously, what kind of dumbass is this guy? You still found it, you didn't steal it."Right" is subjective, but I'd agree that giving it back is the decent thing to do. It still isn't theft.

You are so completely wrong I don't know where to begin. Are you basing your opinion on the case of Finders v. Keepers?

First, it doesn't matter if it is unattended, it is not your property. You removed it from the place the owner placed it. That IS theft. There is leeway for the owners of an establishment to move the item to a lost and found area, but it certainly does not become their property it remains the property of the person who owned it and left it on the table/bar/etc. Depending on the jurisdiction, you can go through a process to dispose of the item (Sell it, trash it, keep it, turn it over to the state, etc) Most jurisdictions clearly define the process and what you are required to do.

Is your justification based on the size of the item in question? That doesn't matter and doesn't alter the ownership of the item.

If someone parked a porsche on the curb and left the keys on the front seat, do you think you wouldn't get charged with grand theft auto if you simple "moved it to get it out of the rain"?

I can see you are trying to justify the theft here, but in the end Gizmodo IS in posession of stolen property.

One who finds lost property under circumstances which give him knowledge of or means of inquiry as to the true owner, and who appropriates such property to his own use, or to the use of another person not entitled thereto, without first making reasonable and just efforts to find the owner and to restore the property to him, is guilty of theft.

"Hey man, I know things seem really tough right now. We had mixed feelings about writing the story of how you lost the prototype, but the story is fascinating. And tragic, which makes it human. And our sin is that we cannot resist a good story. Especially one that is human, and not merely about a gadget — that’s something that rarely comes out of Apple anymore. But hopefully you take these hard times and turn things around. We all make mistakes. Yours was just public. Tomorrow’s another day. We will all be cheering for you."

I "find" stuff all the time. It's like... recycling. Just the other week, I "found" a sweet bike in the park, just leaning against a tree near some total douches playing with a frisbee. Bonus, the seat was still totally warm when I jumped on and pedalled hell for leather away. And talk about the great price that I got when I sold my newly "found" bike down at the local pawn shop!

Heck, I bet if I could get inside Gizmondo's office by "finding" an open window late at night, I could "find" a truck load of great stuff just lying around unattended, free for anyone to take!

It's true that Apple often leaks things for PR, but it doesn't do it like this. It plants things in publications like the Wall Street Journal or the New York Times by calling up journalists, giving pointed hints, and leaving no paper trail. That way, both Apple and the publication have plausible deniability about everything: for Apple, it was just some rumor, and for the papers, it could have been a misunderstanding.

Apple sure as hell leaks things, as every tech company does in some way, shape, or form. This, however, is not how it operates. Specs and price points get leaked, not actual hardware. The iPhone is its big baby, and Steve prefers to have a big reveal on stage in San Francisco when announcing his precious new devices.

There seems to be a lot of bad information surrounding this and as usual Slashdot is going off half cocked without the full picture, let alone RTFA. Gizmodo is not my favorite site, and frankly I think some of the editors over there are assholes (Jesus, I'm talking to you) but some of them are pretty good like Mark and Rosa. Anyway:

First, they didn't out their source: This guy isn't their source, he's the guy that lost the phone. Their source found the device and contacted Apple to attempt to return the device but in typical large company fashion, the people at Apple who knew the device was missing never got that message from the people the guy talked to, and Apple basically blew the guy off.

Gizmodo paid their source for the phone after Apple failed to respond to him. So the guy found a phone, tried to return it to the owner, the owner didn't respond so he sold it. I don't see a problem here.

Gizmodo found out who the guy who lost the phone was and contacted him. Whether or not they had permission from him to publish his name is unknown, but they did talk to the guy. I don't see the entire point in naming names here, but the dude did lose the phone and it is his fault (unless you believe the Apple did it on purpose theories) so while I probably wouldn't have released his name, I don't really have a problem with it as it seems to be a legitimate if somewhat tabloid story.

So, in the end Apple got their device back, we got to know what the next iPhone will look like, and Gizmodo made a shitload of money from all the traffic the story generated. I just hope that guy gets to keep his job. If not Gizmodo should hire him.

Gizmodo or the guy who found it didn't report the device to the police so its stolen. And if they paid someone for the device knowing it wasn't his property, then thats fencing stolen property. Additionally Gizmodo had no newsworthy reason to publish the guys name.

Apparently CA is almost nowhere as the law there requires you to turn over anything over $100 in value and wait 90 days.

Gosh didn't you watch the Brady Bunch as a Kid!!!

Oh and CA law also clearly defines what he did as theft.

And truly in almost NO circumstance does finding an object make it yours. In almost every state there are laws requiring you to wait a set period of time before you can claim lost or abandoned property. And in this case it was misplaced property which the finder can never make a legal claim on.

If the owner is unknown or has not claimed the property, the person saving or finding the property shall, if the property is of the value of one undred dollars ($100) or more, within a reasonable time turn the property over to the police department of the city or city and county.

"So the guy found a phone, tried to return it to the owner, the owner didn't respond so he sold it. I don't see a problem here."

Ok, here's a car analogy since/. loves car analogies: "Well, I was at this bar and found these car keys, so I drove the car around and tried to find the owner. After a few weeks I couldn't, so I sold the car."

If you find something that's not yours you are suppose to try and contact the owner and if you can not, give it to the police. Anything else and it's theft. How else can it work? Are we suppose to trust thefts to be honest?

Their source found the device and contacted Apple to attempt to return the device but in typical large company fashion, the people at Apple who knew the device was missing never got that message from the people the guy talked to, and Apple basically blew the guy off.

This is what their source claims but personally I find this suspect. What if his "trying" involved calling tech support and saying "hurr hurr I have an 4g iphone"? because that's what it sounds like from the article: [gizmodo.com]

No one took him seriously and all he got for his troubles was a ticket number.

He thought that eventually the ticket would move up high enough and that he would receive a call back, but his phone never rang.

I see, so he randomly dialed some numbers and then dialed tech support. Way to go all out, buddy. How about actually contacting the owner?? After all, he had access to the owner's facebook account as well as his home/work phone number before the 4g was remotely disabled. It seems like an obviously half-hearted attempt because the finder did not want return the phone but wanted to appear like he did.

I don't see the entire point in naming names here, but the dude did lose the phone and it is his fault...

Yes, it is absolutely his fault, and he was probably going to suffer harsh consequences already. However, Gizmodo decided to heap public humiliation on top of this. He was already going to get fired, but now he is a laughingstock who will have a seriously hard time getting another job in the industry because of his newfound name recognition.

This guy was already screwed but Gizmodo decided to utterly destroy his career and reputation -- all for a few more clicks. Total dick move.

Yes, it is absolutely his fault, and he was probably going to suffer harsh consequences already.

Unless some policy has been broken (e.g. not removing development phones from the lab) I don't see any reason to fire the engineer. In allowing the phone out of the Apple building Apple are taking a risk. Would you fire him if he'd been mugged?

Yeah, I'm unconvinced of the whole story. How about emailing Steve Jobs directly? Jesus, if you know enough to contact Gizmodo and Engadget and try to get a bidding war going, you certainly are smart enough to write an email saying:

If the guy who found the phone wasn't willing to call some random phone number in the middle of the night, and instead intended to wait until morning to make that call, well certainly that's not being polite...it's blatent theft.

Well, he *did* call random numbers... just not the obvious ones (how about work# of the guy who just left without the phone?) So let's throw out that argument.

And if he didn't anticipate that the phone would be locked down by morning and thus didn't write down the number on a piec

Yeah, hate to break it to you, but the law of the land is not "finders, keepers". The law requires the finder of a lost item to attempt to return said item to the owner, generally by turning it over to the police. After a period of time, which is set by law, unclaimed property is turned over to the finder.

The crime was not in finding the item, but in selling it to a third party. The third party can be liable if he knew or reasonably should have known said item was not the sellers, i.e. if one purchases a to

1. Apple won't fire the engineer. that's bad press. They WILL however remove him from the engineering team and drop him into a job he probably doesn't like, forever. his job security is absolute, but his engineering career at apple is zero. that's the penalty for this level of "oops".

2. the poor guy's engineering career outside apple is also severely damaged by gizmodo's irresponsible release of his name. "carelessly